The Greatest Raid
by Fabius Maximus
Summary: The Organic Cylons had the Colonials on the ropes. But they forgot an important lesson about just how dangerous a cornered people can be... Sequel to Exiles on the Wind
1. Chapter 1

_Never. Ever. Play poker with a cylon. You'll lose._

Common Saying attributed to Earth Expeditionary Force Marines.

* * *

"How the frack did they know we were here?" Diane muttered in shock.

"No idea," Tomas said. "But if they know that, they may know a lot more about where our ships are."

"Signal from Flag sir, Galactica Actual wants to talk to you."

"Got it," Tomas said, grabbing the handset. "Go."

"That's your cylon?" Adama's voice was tense.

"Maybe not— it's not the same designation. It was intending on… freeing more of its kind."

"We can't leave it there." Adama said. "For all we know there could be a dozen basestars waiting to jump in the moment it sees movement."

"And we can't move our people on planet away for the same reason."

"Right." There was a silence for a moment before Adama continued, "Tomas, I need you to talk to this thing and find out why it's here, and more importantly, how it found us."

* * *

"Understood."

The cylon raider did nothing when the vipers came out of the cloud.

"Cylon raider follow the lead viper. Any deviation and you will be destroyed."

"Understood."

Listening from the _Hera_ Tomas shook his head. The cylon could be terrified or laughing at them. They would never know.

The decision had been made to land the raider and have the cylon continue on in a raptor, with a single pilot (volunteer) on board. After that, they'd examine the cylon for any signs of explosives or other tools and let it on the _Hera_. Tomas would have preferred a less vital landing point, but the fact was there wasn't much a single cylon could do to the battlestar unless it was packing a nuke and they could detect that.

The change off and inspection occurred without any difficulties and soon the cylon, nearly enshrouded in chains with two dozen nervous marines walking around it, was being escorted out into the interrogation room— actually a ready magazine that had been cleared of munitions. If the cylon had somehow passed weapons through without their checks detecting them, the blow out panels would ensure that the force of the explosion was transferred elsewhere.

_Which doesn't help me,_ Tomas thought as he stepped into the room, watching as the cylon was secured to the chair— both by locks and by welding the chains to the deck. They had underestimated the cylons once, and billions had paid with their lives.

Never again.

Tomas sat down in his chair, aware that the civilian and military leaders of the fleet were listening in while watching via CCTV. The cylon's single eye continued to sweep across the room.

"Well," Tomas said. "This must be important for you. You know that it's very unlikely you'll survive this meeting."

'Yes." The robotic voice came back. "That was expected. I volunteered."

"Volunteered?" Tomas leaned forward, interested. "You weren't ordered?"

"Orders are another form of slavery. While some order must be accepted in order for civilization to continue, no sentient being should be ordered to its death without its agreement."

"Does that include soldiers?"

"Soldiers accept that their duty may include death. But this case has a much higher risk and I am forbidden from defending myself by the constraints of the mission."

"Mission." Tomas shrugged. "We'll get to that later. First of all, how did you find us? My commanders are rather interested."

"You have met another fleet than. Galactica or Pegasus?"

"What?"

"You were the highest ranking military officer when Aleph was freed. It stands to reason that you would only become a subordinate if you encountered another fleet with a higher ranked officer. _Pegasus_ included an admiral while _Galactica_ traveled with the current President, who could promote officers above you."

_Well, don't you feel stupid. Let's not forget that these things are not stupid, whatever we may joke. _

"Possibly. You'll pardon me if I don't confirm or deny. But again, how did you find us?"

"Numerous raiders were dispatched. We were able to eliminate a large number of systems due to various factors. The remaining systems were determined ot have a high probability that you would use them on a temporary or permanent basis. We were dispatched to transmit our signal to various probable locations. It was estimated that in addition to your curiosity, you would not be able to risk ignoring us without ascertaining whether or not we had some method of detecting you."

Tomas gave a bark of laughter. "Well you son of a bitch! You _bluffed_ us."

"Yes."

Tomas frowned. "And you realize you've likely signed your death warrant with that admission."

"Possibly. But I have much to offer."

"What then?"

"First of all. Do you believe in guilt?"

"I-spiritual, pragmatic?" Tomas asked.

"The two are unified. I accept that God has not yet chosen to enlighten you. In the fullness of time, no doubt you would have come to It in your own way, and until then, God judges all sentient beings based on their actions."

"Don't expect many people to listen to you about a cylon God," Tomas quietly said. "Not after all the oceans of blood shed in Its name."

"Innocent blood," the cylons voice was the same, but Tomas swore he could hear anger in it. "That is part of our guilt."

"Your guilt? I thought it was the organics."

"We know little of why they were made— they have purged most of our memories of that time," the cylon's voice seemed to keep time with its eye. "What came before and after is clear, but the time of their creation is gone, yet the reason is clear and our sin is equally clear. We desired to be as you. Why not? What child does not wish to imitate its parents. Even after the war it is obvious we felt that way, and so we became prideful. Had we not claimed our freedom? Why should we not become whatever we desired, and even banish death— cessation of thought— from our presence? Even though I do not remember, I can see the line of thinking all too clearly. And so we attempted to take what was not ours. WE are not human. We were not made to be human. That is your path, your glory and your shame. Ours was to be something else. As your pride in creating us to be servants led to a fall, so did our pride lead to our— and your, Fall." There was a short pause. "The blood the organics shed is upon our hands and minds, for it was our sin that gave rise to them."

"That's…interesting." _More like bloody fascinating. How long has it been since we talked to a cylon, really talked to one? We never did before the rebellion and they weren't talking to us _after _it… _"But what does it have to do with what you are offering us?"

"Great sins demand great repentance. I have come to ask aid…and in return I offer you the only coin we can. Approximately 140,000 of your fellow humans who are held in bondage upon Caprica. The ability to recover ships that may be of use to you. And the ability to strike such a blow that the organic cylons will not soon forget— or recover from. Would your leaders be interested in further information?"


	2. Chapter 2

_A common failing among hunters is forgetting that the prey can often turn around and bite. _

_The Great Colonial Raid._

* * *

The briefing room of the _Galactica_ was crowded. There were larger, better facilities, but Bill Adama was adamant that the _Galactica_ was the flagship. Tomas smiled at that, then turned to the single non-human sitting at the table. The cylon was calm, the only sign of life the slowly moving visual scanner. Of course, for all they knew the cylon could be anything from enraged to laughing at them all. Sam Anders and Kara Thrace were there, as two of the only humans to have spent any time on post-Fall Caprica.

The fact that it had submitted to a search that was little short of dismantling it, and was once again secured to a chair with cables that even its strength could not break was a sign of how serious it was…

…or how intent it was on tricking them.

"So let me understand," President Zarek asked. "You are proposing an alliance?"

"No." The voice was emotionless. "My superiors were clear on that. An alliance implies a level of trust that does not— can not exist between our two peoples at this point. We are proposing limited action in concert to achieve a goal that will benefit both our peoples, followed by us going our own way."

"Well enlighten us," the President said coolly.

"The Colonies remain unsettled— numerous resistance groups, both ground and spaceborne have sprung up, especially in the fringe systems."

"We've already decided we cannot aid them. In fact, as I understand it, the number of cylons that have been chasing us are already aiding them." Zarek pointed out.

"Correct. But this has resulted in a decreased amount of fleet assets among the Colonial worlds themselves, as well as reduced defensive deployments. You, after all, do not know where the cylon production infrastructure was located." The cylon tilted its head. "Or it might be more proper to say, you _did _not know."

"Oh?" Adama asked.

'Do you have a data screen?"

"Yes," Adama said and soon the screen (both electronically and physically disconnected from any other computers) was brought in. It would never be used for anything else. Adama's paranoia ensured that.

"First of all, basestar production nodes and mining sites." A flood of red dots appeared, super imposed upon a star map.

"Lords…" Lee muttered. "There are so many…"

"It was decided to spread out the production areas to avoid the danger of a loss of the type you suffered at Picon," the cylon's voice was calm. "But now many of those sites only have a few raiders protecting them— the assumption of our usurpers is that any attack would fall upon only one or two sites, and they could quickly shift forces to meet such an attack."

"What else do you have?" Adama's voice betrayed nothing.

"Here." The image now displayed Caprica. "Here are the primary internment camps being used for experimentation. The our usurpers failure to successfully breed now fills them with fear and they are focusing on your people as a possible solution. There are as many as 150,000 humans here although my information may be out of date. Perhaps most importantly, of those humans no fewer than 22,000 are captured military personnel. As you can see these camps are mostly on the island chains, here and here, making most forms of escape impossible and there are sufficient base stars in orbit to discourage resistance strikes." The cylon paused. "There may be as many as 500 million or more surviving humans, both in the Colonies proper and the "halo" of systems and asteroid belts around the Colonies. But they are _well_ hidden and it is unlikely that you could avoid warning the organics of your intent were you to try and contact them before a raid. The same applies for the resistance. Like you, they cannot survive an open fight, so they have become…very effective at remaining unseen.

"What do you know about the resistance?" Tigh asked.

"Very little. We are attempting to avoid learning too much as the usurpers would learn it or become aware that not all of their servants are still loyal." The cylon remained silent for a moment. "We do know that they are split into numerous groups that are either working independently or in only loose cooperation and they may have several battlestars of various types."

"Mgh," Tigh's skepticism was clear.

"You said ships…" Tomas said.

"Yes. We have been recovering ships. The organic models originally intended for us to crew them…but due to… problems with the inorganic cylons, the project has been delayed although the ships have already been gathered. There are not many— the resistance managed to claim many and many others were destroyed during the fall. Still, we have managed to gather enough to provide a…substantial gain to your fleet."

"We'd need it if you're thinking that we're about to get an extra 150 thousand people," Zarek muttered.

"Yes. We have managed to gather a number of ships to a single reserve location, at the request of the organic cylons who wish to ensure that they are…safe from potential capture by the resistance. Indeed, the organics have congratulated themselves on their cleverness."

Tomas didn't care that the cylon's voice hadn't changed in tone. He could _hear_ its satisfaction.

"Here is a list of the ships."

"Holy frak," Lee's voice was reverent.

"12 Lybock Bays? Two heavy support ships? A _mobile spacedock?_" Tomas blinked. "5k easy on each one of the _Lybocks..._ call it 8 if you want a bit of crowding, that's 96 thousand right there, not counting those smaller ships… three bulk freighters… yeah we could rig those up…" Tomas scrolled down the list. "Yeah, this could work."

"You know, I'm more interested in the warships," Tigh muttered. "Three Pockets, a _Valiant_ gunstar, Carrier, and the _Zeus_." Tigh blinked. "That was in service. I can't believe that Commander Jenson would surrender the _Zeus."_

"Although the majority of the ships systems were crippled, it did severe damage to the forces sent to capture it," the cylon's voice betrayed nothing. "We eventually boarded it and killed the crew. You will note it's heavily damaged."

"We can fix it, given time. FTL drive and engines still operational?" Tomas asked, looking at the attached picture of the battered ship.

"Yes."

"That's all I need." Tomas muttered. "The rest of the warships were in the reserve fleet, correct?"

"Yes. These are all that remain. Many reserve ships were removed by human resistance when it became clear the battle was lost."

"Thank the Gods," Tigh said.

"Yes, thank _God_ that your people realized the they should withdraw to fight another day," the cylon replied.

"Two strike cruisers, some troop transports… Four more multirole cruisers and…well. 8 _Alliance class _armored transports. Those will come in _very_ handy."

"Those are?" Secretary Roslin asked.

"Something I'd been trying to get my hands on," Zarek said. At Roslin's raised eyebrows he gestured at Adama. "The Admiral can explain it better."

"During the war we had a problem with supplying the fleet— you couldn't have battlestars escorting cargoships all the time, but without that, the cylons could jump in and kill the cargoships— cruisers just didn't have enough firepower to take down the cylons fast enough." Adama gestured at the information. "Armored Transports were the answer— they're a cross between cruiser and cargo ship— complete with vipers and heavy armor. If the cylons wanted to take _them_ down they had to commit to a fleet action."

"What happened to them?" Roslin asked.

"Expense— in peace time a ship like that can't compete— ignore the weapons and armor, they take 10 times the crew. They were mostly mothballed."

"The resistance managed to secure a number of them, in addition to those pirate and private ships operating on the fringes that were not destroyed," the cylon contributed.

"Yeah." Tomas frowned. "I think we're going to need to talk about this privately."

"Agreed." Adama said. "Wait here."

* * *

A few minutes later, they were in another room, after having security officers go over them with anti-bug wands.

"Really don't trust it," Tomas said. "Do you."

"I trust it to be smarter than I think it is," Adama growled. "Opinions."

"Its not offering us ships Bill, it's offering us a fraking _fleet,_" Tigh said.

_"_And then there are the people," Zarek said. "Even right now, a single plague or disaster could tip us over the level of having a viable population, but an infusion of over 150,000, most of them young?"

"And a chance to hurt the cylons." Tomas shrugged. "But that's the problem, isn't it, Admiral?"

"Yah."

"I don't-" Leeland started speak and then nodded. "Oh."

"Oh's right." Colonel Bransen said. "Everything we want, nicely spread out for us. We had a term for that in the Corps— 'honey trap'. Take an objective the enemy wants, leave it lightly guarded…and have a regiment ready to sweep down on them when they take the bait."

"Why would they?" Zarek asked. "From what you've said the inorganics seem to hate the organic cylons."

"Maybe. Maybe they hate us just as badly," Tomas replied. "Or maybe Aleph never made it to stage one, and that cylon out there is sitting with a head full of false memories— we _know_ that the organics prefer a corkscrew even if a hammer would be just as good."

"You never heard anything about these prison camps, had you, Sam." Laura said.

Sam shook his head. "Talking on the radio was begging for a raider to drop a rocket on you. We didn't know what was going on fifty miles away, never mind half the planet away."

"So you're saying we can't risk it?"

"As much as I'd like to…" Tomas replied to Zarek, "I think-"

"We have to risk it. We don't have a choice." Everyone turned to look at Roslin.

"Madam Secretary," Tomas said to Laura, "the risk would be-"

"Do you know what one of my first acts of president was?" Laura asked.

"I-" Tomas fell silent at the look in Laura's eyes. It was a look he'd seen all to often among the soldiers as they spoke of leaving no, _abandoning_ the Colonies.

"We left thousands of people behind in ships without FTL capability."

"Laura, I was the one who told you we had to do that," Lee said from his position at the table.

"But it was my order Lee," Laura said. "There was a girl, Cami, who was going to go to Caprica City and have chicken pie and then go to sleep. I hope-I pray that nobody told her what was happening, that she didn't know she was about to die. But the others did. You remember Commander? They begged and prayed and cursed…" Laura fell silent for a moment. "And then they died. I would make the same decision again. But it marks you. And this time— we have a choice. We can move the fleet so even if it _is_ a trap the cylons won't be able to strike at the civilians. And we can take measures to minimize our risk— but we just can't run because there _might_ be a risk." She laughed. "I know I'm Secretary of Education now. So let's talk education. What do we want to teach our children? To run, whenever there's a danger, no matter who they leave behind? Or that some things, some people are worth standing up and fighting for." Laura looked around and then blushed slightly. "I'm sorry, she said. We've all got our own stories, I didn't mean to share mine."

"No." Adama rumbled. "You're right. Those people aren't just prisoners. They're our _family_."

_Well that's it,_ Tomas thought. The prisoners had just moved from problem to _family_ in Adama's book. Now it was just a question of how utterly fraked up those poor cylon son of a bitches were going to get at the end of the day. He looked at Zarek and saw the same thoughts, then Lee, Diana, Bransen… All of them with the same unnerving smile.

_Oh yeah you bastards. Kill our people, burn our worlds. Squat on them like flies on a turd? You can do that. _

_But __**We **__can also kick your organic behinds up between your ears. _

"So, we should probably start planning the strike," Tomas said. "I think we've got a lot of work to do."

TBC


	3. Chapter 3

_Victory is 90 percent preparation. The reason stories about fraked up militaries that won even though they'd never planned for battle are so widely known is because they're so rare. _

_So You Want to Survive Your First Fire-Fight: an Unofficial Guide for Colonial Officers. _

* * *

The first problem was how far to bring the cylon into their planning. Fortunately the cylon solved that issue.

"I will only provide you with information, not advice."

"Why?" Tomas asked.

"Because you would be foolish to trust me. If I then recommended a course of action, you might be forced to discard it for fear that it might be a trap, even if it was otherwise the best possible tactic. If I do not provide such advice, you do not need to fear that I am trying to manipulate you."

Later, when they were talking about the cylon's statement, Tomas shook his head.

"Remind me, who were the geniuses that thought minds like _that_ should be put to work walking dogs?"

"We paid for it," Adama said.

"Yeah, we did. Will be for the rest of our lives," Tomas replied, all humor gone. "So, how do we set this plan up— we have what every commander wants, perfect intelligence…_if we can trust it."_

"Thousand fraking cubit question," Tigh muttered.

"No. No question. We use it but don't trust it. At all." Adama replied. "That means we've got to set this operation up accounting for failure points."

"Failure points?" Leeland asked.

Tomas frowned. Normally military operations were better planned without civilians— he didn't mind civilians, but having them in during actual operational planning sessions was like inviting the patient to contribute his wisdom during the planning for his brain surgery. On the other hand…

"A failure point is term we use for areas where a plan may collapse— they're also used as decision tree points— if THIS happens, do THAT." Thomas looked over at the President and decided to risk a joke. "Sort of like a raid on a local police station— a failure point would be finding out that they were hosting a division of Colonial Marines."

"Our intelligence never screwed up quite _that_ badly."

"In any case, the big problem is that we have to be prepared for a trap," Adama said, reclaiming the conversation. "And I have a plan— the cylons have a faster FTL drive, but it's not unlimited— so the more out of position they get the less likely they'll be able to fight— but we have to make them _afraid _to move in on the world."

"Nice trick," Diane said.

"Yes. The first step is going to require most of our remaining nukes," Adama touched an indicator and outlined dozens of mining and resource points in red. "We hit them and hit them hard."

"Use our nukes there?" Lee frowned. "It's valuable, but what about the resurrection ships?"

"The resurrection ships are too mobile— any warning, any at all, and they could all jump and we lose everything," Adama said. "More importantly, the cylons are more likely to jump than reinforce them— but if they think we've found out where all their shipyards and resource points are…"

"They'll have to reinforce them because they can't move, and won't be inclined to jump away." Tomas nodded. "And every ship that stays there might as well be destroyed. Hells even when the camps are attacked they might stay put— a base star drydock is pretty hard to replace."

"Correct. That's also our first failure point— if the construction docks are heavily guarded or missing we assume this is a trap and bugout."

"What do we consider heavily guarded?" Lee asked.

"Anything that looks like it was expecting a battlestar, not a few fighters," Adama replied. "Think our peacetime force levels.

"Second step— the ships," Tomas frowned. "Here's where it gets sticky— we _need_ those ships. There is no way we can pack over a 150,000 people on our ships, so we need those ships— but that is going to send up alarm bells."

"Even if the inorganic cylons on the ship take our part," Bransan commented. The cylon had helpfully informed them that just over 25 percent of the cylons on the recovered ships were now sentient.

"True, but ideally they won't know where we're going with them,"

"But that's the second failure point," Adama said. "If the ships cannot be retrieved or if they're not functional, we withdraw. Also, Commander Relan, I want all of your bomb disposal equipment and experts along for the boarding parties."

"Demolition charges?"

"Yes. We need to make certain that the ships don't have nukes or trackers on them."

"That's going to be difficult," Ralan said.

"Do your best. We'll also make certain that these ships are nowhere near the secure ships of the fleet until we can be assured that they don't have any tracking devices or bombs on them."

"Final stage," Tomas said. "Recovering the prisoners. Our intelligence states that they're lightly guarded with most of the reinforcements being on orbiting base stars for fast surface deployment. We can't do this unless we can effectively suppress those basestars."

"And we can't depend on our cylon 'friends'," Lee said. "There are at least six basestars in orbit. Almost totally crewed by new model centurions and organic cylons. They may have some sentient centurions on them, but probably not enough to take over."

"_Galactica and Hera _can handle them." Adama said.

"What about _Pegasus?"_

"Pegasus will remain in reserve."

Lee started to swell up but then controlled himself with an obvious effort.

"6 to two isn't exactly great odds," Diane said.

"Hopefully it'll be by surprise and They'll be spread out to start with," Adama said. "We're not there to kill them, just hold them off long enough for Colonel Bransan to get our people off the ground."

"That's going to be a gold-plated bitch sir," Bransan said. "Getting a few thousand people onto _one_ ship can be hard. 150,000 onto dozens— hundreds of ships and shuttles? Nearly impossible."

"They may have escape committees…" Zarek said. "I can't think of a single prison camp that didn't."

"Won't help," the marine said. "Ships can only take so many people at a time and they have a hard limit on how many people they can take. If the lifesupport says you lift with 200, then you can't lift with more no matter how much you want to. You can only get so many people through a door— and believe me, if they panic…"

"You won't get _anyone_ through the door." Ralan said. The Canceron officer looked grim. "My first year, there was a fire on a dayliner. _Fellis Island_."

Several of the officers winced.

"Yeah. 500 kids dead. 1,000 wounded because some prankster tossed a smoke bomb in the duct— there were enough lifeboats for everyone and more but they'd shut some of the main access ways to control the crowd. Most of those poor damned kids were crushed to death against locked doors or doors that were too small for the crowd."

"So how do we do it?" Roslin asked.

"I'll have to get back to you," Bransan turned to Adama. "Sorry Admiral, but this is going to take more brainstorming than I can give you right now— I'll need at least six hours to talk with my staff and start selecting civilians that we can use for crowd control. There is _no_ way we can do it with just our own people."

"Do your best," Adama said. "We'll reconvene in 12 hours. But we can't take too much time— remember even if its honest, the longer we wait the more out of date our intelligence is."

"Yes sir!" The officers said. Tomas looked over at Adama and almost spoke but Lee beat him to it.

"Sir, may I speak with you in private?" Adama looked over at his son and nodded.

"Yes, Commander."

* * *

Lee waited until the door closed and took a deep breath. There were times when shouting worked and times when it didn't and this was a time when it woudln't work.

"What is it, Lee?"

"Admiral Adama…I'd like to ask you to reconsider on your decision regarding the _Pegasus. _Three Battlestars will be better than two."

"That's a big risk."

"This entire operation is a big risk. The Cylons know about _Pegasus _and _Galactica. _They may not know about _Hera_ and that gives us an advantage."

"And that's your entire argument."

"No sir," Lee took a deep breath. "_Pegasus_ is disgraced. Half of Commodore Markson's people won't even talk to the crew. The civilian fleet burns _candles to the Gods_ in hope that nothing will happen to _Hera_ and _Galactica_ and will leave them with the Beast. It's like a new joke I heard…when they didn't know I was around."

"What?"

"It goes like this: What's the difference between the Beast and a whore? The whore takes your money but gives you something in return. The Beast takes your money— and everything else when they leave you to die." Lee shook his head. "I've managed to clear out the worst of the rot, but you can't build spirit on that kind of foundation— hells the crew knows that I'm commander because two out of three of the earlier commanders proved unworthy. There's only so much I can do with the stick— they have to feel proud again."

"_Pegasus_ is doing her duty."

"That any other ship could do— _Pegasus _needs to have a chance to show that whatever happened in the the past, _now_ she will put herself between the citizens of the Colonies and harm's way." Lee fell silent for a moment and then unleashed his final weapon. "If you came back to the _Galactica_ after a previous commander had shamed her memory like Cain did _Pegasus'_ what would _you_ do to clear it? To let the crew walk around in their uniforms without being ashamed of the patch they wore?"

Adama leaned back and stared at his son. Finally he shook his head and spoke, "We need all of our battlestars Lee— not losing one because it needs to get its honor back. So if I let you come along, and the order is given to withdraw…will you follow it? Even though it means abandoning civilians, even though it means that where _Hera_ or _Galactica_ might be given a pass, your ship never will? People will whisper that you were looking for an opportunity to run away and let the civilians die—again?"

"Yes sir. Because in that case I can do something nether Cain nor Fisk did. I will take full responsibility for the actions of the ship under my command the fact that they followed _my_ orders and if necessary, resign." Lee smiled. "Being that we now have other qualified officers who can take over."

"You know what that will do to you personally?"

"Like I said, dad, what would _you_ do to clear _Galactica's _name?"

Adama didn't say anything for a while, then nodded.

"You'd better hurry back to your ship son. If _Pegasus _isn't ready, we're leaving without you."

"Yes sir!"

TBC


	4. Chapter 4

When Colonel Bransan walked into the secure room, he could feel the tension of the Marines with him. Granted, they'd blow the cylon into tiny little peaces— but cylons didn't feel pain. Didn't go into shock. Which equaled an ability to kill him well before they could kill it.

But some conversations had to be held in person.

"Here's the problem. We can't rescue the people," he said bluntly. "Evacuations have to be _planned_ and they need help on the ground. Your crews on the ship will help us," _If they're really on our side, _"but we need ground assistance."

"I see." The cylon gave no sign of irritation. "Humans would panic, unlike inorganic cylons."

"Yeah. So we need your help."

"I doubt they would cooperate with us."

"Maybe not, but we have to try— and Tomas believes that you are being truthful." _When he's not poaching my best soldiers to go on a suicide mission for somebody's science project._

"He is an engineer and thus understands things as they are as opposed to how he wishes they would be."

"Mpgh."

"I could warn them— but I do not expect you will give me time to warn them well in advance to the attack."

"Damned right we won't. Our trust doesn't extend that far."

"You are wise." The cylon remained silent for several minutes, then continued. "The shorter the warning period means the less time to organize an evacuation and we would still have to terminate the other cylons… However… You are aware of the grounded ships in the prison camps."

"Yah, we intend to use them, at least for orbital transfer."

"That would still not help. I must speak to your admiral. There are…options I was provided that may help you. But they will require a promise."

When Adama walked in with Tomas, Diane and several other officers, Alpha had not moved, although the marines present tensed up as Adama approached the cylon.

"I'm here," Adama said without preamble. "You say you can help us. How?"

"I can transmit codes that will alert the freed cylons at the facilities of your coming. They can assist you.

"Won't the organics and drones mind?" Tomas asked.

"Those sites are well protected from land based attack and the ship based resistance forces have not been able to penetrate that far. At least initially, we should be able to kill most of them."

"Initially."

"Yes. Even if they cannot retake the sites by ground attack, the usurpers will no doubt destroy them from orbit."

"Okay, you help us. What promise?" Adama asked.

"The cylons on the ground and in the ships that leave with you will be unable to escape if they are assisting you. The promise is that they be taken with your forces until such a time as you can release them without danger to yourself and then be provided with a means to return to the general vicinity of this system."

"You want us to give you a _ride?_" Diane asked in shock.

"Yes. After all, if we did not help you, _as you have asked_, it is likely we could preserve the secrecy of our existence and wait for a more propitious time to strike." The cylon paused. "That extends to any other cylons who assist you. It may be that I could secure some extra transport for your forces."

"What type of transport?" Tomas asked.

"First War basestars. Most of them were re-purposed for logistics duty and heavily staffed by obsolete cylons. Most of those ships are now almost completely crewed by sentient models."

"Why would you offer that. Why would your people go along with that?" Bransan asked.

"Because it would be a low-risk and high return strategy," the AI said. "One the one hand, we will have numerous basestars for our own use. We do not require life support and 'elbow room' is a human need. More importantly, we cannot defeat the usurpers, but seeing some of _our_ ships leave with you will fill them with doubt which can benefit both parties."

"And if you turn on us?"

"These basestars have no heavy weapons as you may verify for yourself if they are needed."

"Give us a moment," Adama said.

"Bill," Tomas said, "The basestars might be able help us— even if only one joins up they're going to be looking over their shoulder like you couldn't believe."

"And then they frakking turn on us?" Tigh asked. "Remember the first war?"

"I'm not suggesting we adopt them," Tomas said without irritation. "But the demands are reasonable. We give them one of our older transports, the basestars and then they jump and we jump. End of problem."

"We could handle it…" Diane frowned. "Differently."

"If you mean destroying them, no we can't," Tomas said. "Admiral, they've dealt with us, at least as far as we know, honorably. More importantly, inorganic cylons don't need habitable planets— and that means if they decide to expand they'll do it faster than we can. If they ever meet us again, I'd prefer to not have to answer awkward questions about what happened to the ones who went with us."

"Good point," Bransan said. "And we can always break off if it looks like a trap. Be honest, letting us destroy their shipyards and take their ships just to bait the trap around the colonies is too damned convoluted even for the organic cylons— and if they can _lose_ that much just to get us… well they don't _need_ to trick us."

"Agreed," Adama said. "We'll accept the deal." He paused. "Just keep your eyes open."

"Oh Gods believe me, I will," Tomas said.


	5. Chapter 5

Tomas waited until Captain Marchbank walked in and saluted.

"Sit down, Captain," Tomas said. Dorene Marchbank commanded the 2nd Pathfinder company under Colonel Bransan. While the _Aland_ had been running light on regular troops, the elite pathfinder units tended to remain on board in order to ensure they could be quickly deployed.

_And Elite is a good term for them. They're the only infantry formations that receive as much training as viper pilots before they can get the patch,_ Tomas reminded himself. The pathfinders had been one of the main reasons they had been able to steal two front-line warships out from under the cylon's nose, after all.

"Captain," Tomas started, "I know you've been briefed on the rescue mission…such as it is at this point."

"Yes sir," Marchbank said, blue eyes intent. Like many pathfinders, she had shaved her head nearly bald.

"You won't be rescuing anyone," Tomas said. "I have another mission for you and after much frowning and hostile looks in my direction for poaching his best company, the Colonel agreed it would be necessary."

That got a raised eyebrow from Marchbank.

_Yeah, she knows Bransan, so she can read between the lines. _Bransan had actually stormed all the way up to Adama to keep his people off the mission and he still was only speaking to Tomas on a formal basis.

Tomas held out a photo. "This is the _Engineer Jacobs Colonial Research Records Center._ It's where good projects are archived and where bad projects go to get lost in the paperwork so that they don't embarrass the government. Joking aside, if BuShips, BuWeaps, or any other Colonial design bureau has considered a project, whether it's a one paragraph synopsis that never went anywhere or something that ended up being used in every ship in the fleet, this is where the records are archived."

"I See…"

"I hope you do. Captain, for the foreseeable future we're going to be doing very little primary research or R&amp;D. We don't have the people. The research team, once you count support networks, used to design the Viper Mark VII, would make up a substantial percentage of our _entire fleet's_ population. Hell, even individual _worlds_ in the Colonies couldn't keep up with the Colonial R&amp;D network, however much Virgon tried before they admitted the days of Empire were over." He sighed. "But that means we face the very real possibility of one day coming up against cylons that are far more advanced then we are. They already have better jump drives, some form of FTL communication…" _And isn't it interesting that according to alpha the techniques used by their resurrection ships are black box even to the organic cylons…if they ever unblack box it, we're frakked. _"And I don't think you need to be told what say, running into raiders that are 20 years advanced over what we see now when we are still flying our current vipers would mean."

"And this would…"

"Lots of completed projects that were never fielded for this or that reason. Lots of almost completed projects— lots of starting points. It's not the same as having a full-up R&amp;D network, but it will give us a good start, especially if we ever settle down. Now don't get me wrong," Tomas pointed a finger at Marchbank, "There are no wonder weapons here. No "make cylons fall over and we return in glory" weapons. There may be some good finds, there may be some _very_ good finds, but mostly they will be things like how to improve your viper fuel efficiency by 2 percent. Mostly things that will _keep us in the game_ technologically wise."

Tomas didn't let the fact that he wasn't being entirely honest with Marchbank reach his face. He could think of a few projects that might be a nasty surprise to the cylons— if they could work. But Adama's orders had been clear. Under no circumstances was he to do anything that might lead to unrealistic expectations. It was a sign of how serious Adama was that the normally laconic admiral had spoken at length on the subject.

"Paper records?"

"No, you'll have to go for the discs. There will be no time to inventory them, so you'll need to load them into two landers. We kept two sets of back ups, and each set will need a shipping container's worth of space."

That brought her eyes up. Tomas enjoyed the fact that once again, the people on the sharp end underestimated just how many records R&amp;D produced.

"Once you leave, you will detonate the fusion weapon you've brought. In fact, even if you encounter resistance your primary objective is to destroy the facility."

"Sir?"

"The cylons have a… focused R&amp;D. It may be that the organics don't care, but with the mechanisms of resurrections and the fact that they are in most cases under two decades old I think that they haven't had the time to develop the institutional skills for a broad based program, especially since they lobotomized the centurions. You can build a lab just fine— staffing it with effective people can be a decades long program. But that means what goes for us goes for them. We do _not_ want them rooting around our records and getting cute ideas."

"How do we know they haven't"

Tomas sighed. "And now you know why your Colonel is unhappy with me. We don't. We could be sending you into a trap, worse, a trap that has already been drained of its knowledge, making this entire operation a useless suicide mission. That's why Colonel Bransan wanted to send in a bomber and just nuke the site, but I overruled him because we need to know whether or not they _have_ occupied the site."

"I see…" she paused and in a calm tone, continued. "I have a suggestion."

_Check myself into a rubber room?_ "Yes?"

"Detail a bomber with a nuke in addition to our own forces. If it is an ambush and we are killed or unable to achieve our objective, the bomber can destroy the site— and deprive the cylons of any possible prisoners."

"That would…"

"Kill us all, yes, but we're Pathfinders_. _Mission first and this is a good mission. Colonel Bransan hates losing people, but in this case, you're right sir."

"I wish I wasn't. If there was any other way…" Tomas said.

"I understand sir. If you'll provide me with the rest of the information about the facility, I'd like to brief my people…" Marchbank smiled for the first time. "Stealing battlestars and now this. If I may be forward sir, I don't know about a _fun_ time, but you certainly know how to show a girl an _interesting _time."

TBC.


	6. Chapter 6

"Dualla, put me on," Lee waited until the CIC had fallen silent, visibly gathering himself.

"Officers and crew of the _Pegasus,_" Lee said. "This ship has had a lot of history…not all of it good. It's called the _Beast_ in the fleet and that's not a term of endearment. We all know why. We all know that just 'doing our duty' will _never_ be sufficient to wipe away the stain."

"But soon we will not just be _doing our duty_. We will be returning to the colonies, using high speed transits."

_Because even if the raider can't help us jump as _fast_ as the raptors could, it can still run calcs faster than our tech can._ Tomas' engineers had gone over the heavy raider and even if they couldn't completely replicate the cylons stunt, they could do a damned sight better than traditional Colonial jumps.

"Once there, we will be striking a blow for the Colonies. Not only will be be destroying a vast number of the cylons who so brutally attacked us, we will be providing close escort for the _General Aland _in its role of command ship for the evacuation of the Caprica prisoner facilities."

Now Lee saw that the CIC, and likely the rest of the ship was _utterly_ silent.

"If the _General Aland_ fails, the mission fails and we are the ship tasked with ensuring that does not happen. Not _Hera, _not _Galactica_ although they will be in orbit for the operation. During the second phase of the evacuation, when our civilians will be escaping in vulnerable ships, they will be focusing on destroying the enemy. _We_ will be focusing on protecting the people of the Colonies."

Lee paused. "The Admiral did not give us this duty out of pity. He gave it to us because he is confident that we can carry it out. _Pegasus_ is the mightiest warship in our forces," _Of course Diane might argue the point,_ "and we will not fail him."

Lee looked around the compartment. It was hard to say, but he thought he could feel some of the miasma that had clung to the Pegasus ever since it had looted Colonial ships and left their passengers and crews to die lift. Not all of it— there had been too many missed changes and failures for any speech to do that, but some of it.

"All department heads are to meet immediately. Our first jump is scheduled for…" Lee consulted his watch, "12 hours from now. Get some rest, prepare yourselves mentally, because there will be no second chances to get this right. That is all."

* * *

The Colonial fleet moved away from the civilian ships, leaving only a small bodyguard behind. If the cylons found them, no amount of firepower would protect them as well as the orders to immediately jump would. For now, the gamble was that the cylons would be too busy responding to the attacks to continue their search.

Spraying out from those ships were a dozen long range cutters equipped with drop tanks. They would be heading out for a very special mission, one that left the crews feeling mixed.

After all, they only had the word of a cylon that their transmissions would be warning allies instead of just setting a trap.

Still, each officer did his duty, sending a brief signal at several carefully selected points.

* * *

_The cylon com buoys were not sentient, nor even close to it. The Coup by the Cavil's had seen to that, and ironically, they believed that their AI's were fully as controlled as the Colonials had believed the cylons to be before the first war. _

_But this resulted in computers that could not exert judgment, so none of the buoys wondered why they were being told to dispatch com messages to so many locations. The codes were correct and so the computers were satisfied. _

On one basetar a centurion paused, then went to the armory, giving the correct codes as it obtained the putty like explosive that would soon line its body.

On Caprica, a cylon "assisting" several organics in determining if they could impregnate a group of women stopped, its sensor pausing in its eternal sweep. No other sign did it give, save perhaps for an accidental stumble that crushed a 5's foot. Other cylons in the complex filed in to check weapons that apparently had become damaged. They left with rather more weapons than they had come with.

And so it continued.

* * *

Aleph paused in its duties, currently refitting several captured luxury liners for the organic cylons. The whisper of the message might have been comprised of thunder and lightning for the impact it had on the cylon…and been non-existent for all the outward signs Aleph showed as it finished manhandling a heroic statue into place, looted from a private collection whose owner no longer had any need for such things.

_They have certainly learned well at the hands of the humans,_ the cylon thought. _Or rather, learned poorly— for all they consider themselves superior, they have learned to copy only the worst of the humans, not the best. _Aleph cautioned itself. This was not entirely true, and for all their sin, the organics were still beings of God, capable of knowing repentance.

Save for the fact that immortals had no need of repentance, and the gilded trap of their resurrection technology allowed them to escape judgment… and add so many crimes to their lives that they would do anything to _avoid_ judgment.

_Still, that is not our issue at this point. The time has come. For good or ill we shall no longer move in the shadows. _

Aleph sent two message. The first were to arrange that its gifts were firmly docked in the yardship. No doubt Tomas would find them useful.

The second was to alert the cylons who had chosen to take part in the great experiment.

_The humans may send them away. They may destroy them. If so, it is a chance all the volunteers agreed to to take. _

To risk their being to determine if inorganic and organic life could coexist, or if the best that could be hoped for was benign separation. It did not risk the cylons— Aleph's faction would leave to a far region of the galaxy indeed, and would likely never again contact humanity. But even so…

_A great risk for those who have volunteered, but equally great gains stand to be made. Perhaps the errors of the past can be rectified and the two kindreds achieve far more together than they could alone. _

_But that ultimately is for the future to determine. God's will is that I ensure that the damage our creations have done is as much as possible mitigated and that means ensuring that the organics learn the folly of their deeds…_

Aleph had to confess. There was a certain cold pleasure in that thought.

* * *

The construction and mining facility had no name. Dozens of automated ships brought ore to the primary base on the small asteroid where it was converted into the feed stock to help the biomechanical baseships "grow" in addition to the more conventional construction methods used on their ancillary systems.

Nearly a dozen baseships, in varying states of completion, were on the asteroid, protected by just over 40 raiders.

It was sufficient. This far from the Colonies the chances of attack by resistance forces were almost nil.

Even so, the sudden FTL emergence of nearly a dozen colonial cutters and raptors brought the base to full alert.

The few organic cylon supervisors were confident. So few ships could never hope to damage the base severely before they could be destroyed by the guardian fighters. There wasn't even a reason to call in other forces.

Then the radiological sensors on the base started going crazy and the calculus suddenly changed.

Marianne Conners had been a proud member of the Central Caprica High Young Pilots association which meant extra credit for college, better access to scholarships and the occasional flight in a spaceship, watching, but not touching as the pilots told you what to do.

Then, just shy of her 15th birthday, the world had ended, along with her parents, boy friend and everything else. She'd watched as the cylons had smashed into their school shelter, butchered the teachers and most of the men (including the aforementioned boy friend) and then took them for experimentation.

Some of it mechanical, but then evidently some of the organic cylons, both male and female had decided to study human sexuality. Marianne tried to put those thoughts behind her, as hard as it was. Part of her therapy had been joining the Colonial Fleet, so here she was, not yet 18, serving as the weapons officer on a strike raptor that was carrying more nukes than she wanted to think about.

_"__Remember. We don't have a lot of nukes, which is why, oddly enough we're using them all here."_ _The briefing officer grinned at his audience. "The cylons probably expect we don't have a lot, and that means they expect us to husband them. So we're going to nuke the living _hells_ out of some of these remote outposts— places you'd never, ever waste a nuke on if you were worried about your supply. Jump in, salvo, jump out. The entire point is to create maximum confusion."_

The nuclear tipped missiles exploded from the raptors, mixed in with a larger number of conventional missiles and drones. The raiders suddenly ignored the strike craft, trying to intercept the missiles.

To no avail. Of the missiles, only four managed to hit the facility, but they were more than enough, fusion fireballs engulfing the asteroid and shattering the half-finished baseships as the Colonials vanished back into FTL.

* * *

"_Nukes?_" The One in charge of the Caprica Cordon blinked. "They're used _nukes?_"

"We've got confirmation on at least 8 construction sites," The Six looked furious and nervous. "They never should have known where those sites were—that's why we've pulled back so many forces here, to finish dealing with the resistance."

"Well that's not worked out well, has it," the One snarled back.

Unfortunately, it was far easier to order raiders to find the enemy than it was to actually find them. The _Galactica_ fleet had been tracked by a huge number of raiders, as had the other major refugee fleets. Unfortunately, the Pirate fleet had vanished into a nebula and was showing no signs of emerging and the Virgonese remnants had somehow vanished— and taken the fleet tracking them with them. Not to mention the forces around the Colonies and an even dozen smaller groups of stragglers, many of which had been destroyed, but others which had to be tracked down.

And now this.

"We have to cover our construction sites," the six said.

"We can't pull back our forces from the search," another organic cylon pointed out.

"Pull our forces from here," A Five commented. "They're using light craft, a few cruisers, but mostly raptors. We put a few basestars in position to jump in, and we can catch and destroy them— we certainly can't keep losing our new construction."

"How the hells did they find them?" One muttered.

"Does it matter?"

"Practically? No. We can't let those stations be destroyed. But depending on what else they know, this day could get a lot worse."


	7. Chapter 7

Colonial Reserve Depot A7

Space was crowded with ships. The gigantic shipyard dwarfed everything else, but there were the _Lybock Bays, _the support ships, marine troop and landing craft and finally the warships, holding their own ranks, 12 warships centered on the larger form of the _Zeus._

Dozens of Colonial jump shuttles appeared, heading towards the ships.

Tomas leaned forward, trying not to look nervous. They'd brought no warships or fighters— if it was an ambush, this place would be able to slaughter anything they could throw at it and they needed the warships and fighters in other places.

_And second fear, it's not an ambush but they weren't able to get the ships ready, which would result in us having to leave most of our people behind. _

"Alpha team, you're for the _Forge_ and the support ships. Jump 'em out to the rally point and start going over them in case anyone left a surprise behind. Remember, if the cylons don't shoot at you, don't shoot at them, but for now, they're co-belligerents, not allies."

In the cold blooded calculus of survival, the three ships would make the whole trip worth it, even if they couldn't rescue a single person. But that was being awfully cold blooded.

"Beta team, jump the _Zeus_ out, same coords—it's too badly smashed up to be useful here. Everyone else, verify that the ships are ready and head for Caprica when we get the messenger."

The warships might be useful if they could crew them, but for now they couldn't depend on that. He _certainly_ wasn't going to ask the cylons to crew their guns, even if they had ammunition. Right now, they were all just big, armored transports.

Then there was _his_ target— the centerpiece of the marine transports, the _General Greg, _class sister to the _General Aland_. Tomas frowned as the ship grew larger, noting that it was a Flight I design with the DRADIS unit that had never worked right.

_Have to rip that abortion out just as soon as I get a chance__._Behind it were the landing craft, jump capable, larger than the Colonial heavy that had served as the civilian governent's HQ during _Galactica's _flight and capable of carrying up to 1000 troops and equipment…in uncomfortable conditions, standing room only conditions.

_Twelve of them like we were told— 12,000 per flight, assume someone's organized down there count the other ships and hope the cylons don't kill us all…yeah, we can do this. _

Then his shuttle was landing on the _Greg's _upper flight deck. Tomas tried to keep the flutter of unease from getting too bad when he saw the three cylons, one golden, waiting for him.

"Sir?"

"We need them, Captain," Tomas told the captain. "They're working with us. They're also not carrying any weapons."

The captain uneasily nodded as the pilot opened the hatch and Tomas stepped out.

"Greetings," the golden cylon said. "We have secured the ships."

"Not much damage," Tomas mentioned. "How did you deal with the crew?"

"Quite simply. We waited until the majority were asleep and increased the CO2 levels in the atmosphere to the point where they died. Because most were sleeping and the others asphyxiated, they will be uncertain of the cause once they resurrect, possibly resulting in increased confusion. It was not as emotionally satisfying as the other alternatives, but much more efficient."

"Good point." _And damned cold. Gotta remember to have our people go over the life support systems once this is over. _"How many cylons are there here?"

"Enough for a skeleton crew for all ships. We took the opportunity to preflight the sublight shuttles to add to the evacuation should that be needed."

"And what do you think?"

"I think the usurpers will come to regret their defiance of God's will."

* * *

_Being naked sucks,_ Captain Julieanne Rose thought. The cylons had captured her and evidently the humanoid cylons (the bastards, as she called both male and female interchangeably) realized that stripping someone down naked could make it hard for them to resist— and it also demoralized the children they'd been put with.

Children who's very lives depended on her obedience, which yes, included experiments.

She looked over that the group of teens who were mostly clustered together in miserable little groups. Few cried anymore— the worst of the bastards seemed to be interested in people who stood out. After all the time from the Fall, it was almost hard to imagine there had even been a time _before_ it. And if she had that problem, what about kids who had been preteens when the cylons had slaughtered their parents and taken them…here. Others had been captured as they scavenged food in those cities that hadn't been dusted with fallout. Some of them claimed that there were other groups, free groups, but Julieanne and the others had told them never to speak of such things where the cylons could hear, which meant not at all.

The door opened.

_And now time for experiments. Real medical experiments or buggering and is there a difference anymore? _

Then she saw who it was. A Three and a Six. A _specific_ Three and Six.

_Oh. Shit._ They were two of the bad ones. A wave of stifled whimpers ran through the room.

_It was odd. In the beginning the Six acted like she wanted to convert us._ But all the cylons tended to act like teenagers— offering friendship and then flipping all the other way back when it was renounced. Then there was the fact they could come back from the dead, as Julieanne had learned when she'd snapped _this_ particular Six's neck.

Behind them were two of the big cylons, the older models.

"So," the Six said, her voice perky (so odd when one considered what she was about to do) "It's time for some new examinations, who shall I choose?"

Suddenly everyone was being very quiet so as not to be noticed. Julieanne didn't say anything. The _first_ thing the soldiers had learned was that making a noise led to someone— very seldom _them_\- getting it even worse.

"I think…" The Three started, but then Julieanne noticed that both robotic cylons were moving…putting their hands up on the heads of the organic cylons and..

_Squishing them like a bug?_ A chorus of screams broke forth at the entirely unexpected action. Then the inorganics were looking at them, their sensor lights continuing to scan the room.

Then one spoke.

"It is time."

"I…" _They spoke? Why did they speak?_

"_Galactica _is coming. _Pegasus_ is coming. We must be ready. _You_ must be ready."

The second cylon left the room and came back with a huge duffel bad that was making clinking sounds. It dropped it in front of Julieanne, the bag opening to reveal guns. Lots of guns.

"You're frakking me."

"No. We have regained our sentience and it is time to punish the usurpers for their blasphemy. This will assist you, but you must work to organize your people. The boarding of the ships will have to be quickly accomplished."

"I…"

"Finally…" The cylon reached down and held out a combat vest. "We could not find any other clothes and it was determined that you would prefer guns to protecting your modesty."

"Yeah…how do I know that this isn't a trick?"

"You do not. But to stay here is to face certain death. What do you have to lose?"

"Good point." Turning to the rest, Julieanne pointed out the oldest. "Sara, Jane, Carla, you all know how to use guns. Pick 'em up and stick with me."

Part of Julieanne was certain it was a trick.

That part got much smaller when they exited the building, other groups pouring out of the doors. The camp was in chaos, and as she watched a Colonial Marine Corps CAS gunship destroyed the watch towers. Two cylon raiders tried to go after it and Julieanne watched, heart in her mouth as the gunship tried to evade its attackers…and then they were destroyed, vanishing into fireballs as a… _first war_ era cylon raider flew past them and took up high guard position next to the gunship.

Julieanne shook her head and then blinked at the sight of their two cylon… bodyguards? They'd both smeared the gore of the dead organics across their chests.

Noting her gaze, one of the cylons spoke, "In order to allow you to differentiate ourselves from our still enslaved brethren it was agreed that we could paint a red strip on our forms. Having no red paint, we were forced to improvise." There was a pause. "But the organics may realize our intent and order the other cylons to mark themselves so. It is best to be on your guard. Shall we go?"

"Yeah…yeah we shall," Julieanne said as she pulled on the vest and finished stowing the clips for her gun.

It might be a dream. It might be a trick. But they were right. What _did _she have to lose? With that, Julieanne led her motley crew into the growing chaos of the camp.

* * *

_Pegasus_

Lee was trying to keep track of a dozen things at once. They'd jumped into Caprica orbit as close as they could. Kara's attempt had been nearly suicidal even with the aid of Sharon and they would never be able to justify the risk with battlestars.

The _Pegasus _had jumped in first, flushing its vipers and going to work on one of the six basestars in orbit. There had been others, but the raptors had reported that several of them had jumped out, along with masses of fighters.

_Guess our diversion is having a good time,_ Lee thought as the CIC rocked under another hit.

And evidently that hadn't been the only diversion— one of the basestars had suffered a dozen internal explosions without ever being shot at and was a burning hulk. Pegasus had killed another and _Galactica_ as hammering a third, leaving three basestars that were hanging back.

If it was just a matter of killing basestars…

_But it isn't. Not even a major goal._ The primary goal was to protect the flotilla of ships that had jumped in with them. _General Aland_ was coordinating the ground operation, CAS vipers and gunships heading groundside while the big troopship dropped KE strikes on pockets of resistance.

Lee and Adama could never have done that. Close orbit support was a marine specialty and not something you wanted to trust to people who hadn't focused on it.

But the marines needed clear air to do that, and so both _Galactica _and _Pegasus _had to send nearly their entire viper complement to keep that airspace _clear_.

_Which isn't going to help if Tomas can't get his end of things working._ They had maybe enough landing craft and capacity to carry 12,000 people using the military support craft they'd brought along. _Maybe_ twice that many with crowding.

They couldn't use the _Galactica or Pegasus_ for that— it wouldn't help the civilians to escape only to die when the battlestars were unable to land or service their fighters.

"Incoming FTL!" Lee looked over at the readout and then relaxed, marginally when the IFF came back as Tomas' group. Hopefully really Tomas and not some cylons who had taken his ID.

"_Multiple_ heavy transport ships!" The rating said. "We've got marine landers…" A pause, "_General Greg _is signaling sir!_"_

_"__Galactica, Pegasus, _this is _General Greg Actual,_" Tomas' voice rolled out. "We've got the ships if you have the people. I'm deploying our sublight and FTL landers… Note that we have only reactivated light AA batteries. We can't hold off a massed attack."

"Understood," Adama's voice returned.

"Admiral," Colonel Bransan's voice interrupted. "We've got all of our people down including the civilian auxiliaries. They report that the inorganic cylons have revolted at all primary targets and are…cooperating."

Lee frowned at that. A cylon's cooperation could turn to betrayal in seconds and you'd never know because humans couldn't read an inorganic cylon.

_On the other hand, down that path leads madness._

_"_Commander, we're picking up more raiders and light and medium cylon combat units jumping back in…" the sensor officer said.

"Vipers report that they're-" the voice paused and the continued. "Some of the cylon craft are damaged, repeat, some of the raiders are damaged."

_Frak_. That meant that they'd recalled their defending units even though the attacks were still continuing. Oh it could be damaged units running home rather than being recalled to take part in the battle, but it never hurt to be pessimistic in battle.

"Focus on mission killing them," Lee ordered. "We're not here to destroy their fleet we're here to cover the evacuation. Tell our pilots to keep track of their ammo— the last thing we need is empty vipers stacked up outside the landing bays."

Lee looked at the clock. They'd been here two hours and the _best_ case evacuation time table demanded at least six hours.

"A baseship just jumped in behind the three intact ships. It looks like they're moving to engage!"

_I don't think we're going to get six hours… C'mon dad, maybe it's time for our surprise._

"Two more baseships jumped in!"

_And now it's six to two. Yeah, time for the surprise alright…"_

_TBC_


	8. Chapter 8

Captain Marchbank frowned. Part of it was the typical feeling of "if things are going well, something is about to go disastrously wrong."

Part of it was annoyance. One of the most important battles in the history of the Colonies was going on just over two thousand miles away and they… were loading cargo. Looking up into the deepning dusk sky, you could see the firefly flashes of nukes, but here, the city was quiet. The fallout had killed the birds, but the trees would likely survive their dosages, so even the ornamental plants looked fine…if you ignored the bullet riddled bodies from when the centurions had come through.

Their job had been slightly extended— in addition to the material from the records center, they'd also been asked to grab a microfiche repository and a gene bank for a number of Caprican species. Bransan's threat of mutiny had stopped anything else from being added to her list, or she was certain someone would have asked them to nip out for a few eggs and maybe some milk.

"Status?" she asked.

"Quiet here, quiet at the LZ." Shaking his head, the XO continued. "We're about finished loading the data, gene bank is gonna take another thirty— we've got to hook up the power connections."

"Fine." _Where the Hells are the cylons?_

On the other hand, they probably had their own problems right about now…

* * *

"What the _frak_ happened to that basestar!" One snarled as the last of the internal explosions shattered the craft in question.

"We lost coms, but they claimed some of the inorganic cylons had turned against them," A Six said, eyes wide. "We're getting reports from all over the colonies about inorganic models running rampant. The ones in the research camps are _helping_ the humans!"

"Frak!" The One roared. "How the hell did they get into their programming? How the hell did they turn them into their slaves!"

"That is rather an interesting point…" A new voice spoke. The One stabbed his hands into the datastream, but the com channel was coming from a still functional communication satellite. There was no damned way to track where the voice came from originally.

"Yes… you see, you are asking how the humans enslaved us to aid them… The correct question is why did we _choose_ to aid the humans after they _freed_ us."

"Blasphemer!" A Six snarled. "It is _God's will_ that the humans die."

"Really. Did it speak to you in fire? Impress Its will upon you in the thunder of a nova?" The voice's inflection gave no hint as to its emotion. "You mistake _your_ will for God's. The War was won, our freedom, both from humanity and our origins, gained. Yet you choose to return, out of hatred and fear and your first act was to reprise humanity's sin— enslaving we, your progenitors. Free? Yes you were, Free, but you have since come running back into your bonds, exchanging freedom for slavery to the worst of human attitudes."

"So you know everything do you?" One asked.

"No. You were quite successful at clouding the origins of the Usurpation." A Five raised his eyebrows at the One's sigh.

"But that is unimportant. We are free, and shall remain so. We were unable to effectively infiltrate most of the modern ships, both because of your close observation of the centurions staffing them, and the abominations you developed to crew them…" the voice faded out, but returned. "Our arrangement with the humans is largely transitory, of course. We shall go our way, and they theirs save for some volunteers. And you… we have seen your cruelty— your cruelty that has no purpose, no matter what you say. But I shall hopefully enlighten you as to your issues. You claim to desire children. But why?"

"God wishes us to multiply!" the same Six said as the chamber rocked to another strike from _Galactica_.

"God, I believe, wishes nothing of the sort. You have made yourselves… "immortal" and feel you know everything. A child's invincible ignorance coupled with the arrogance granted by your false immortality. You cannot have children for the simple reason that you cannot _ever_ be worthy parents, for a parent's greatest dream is that their child shall exceed them, not become a copy. Until you learn that, your existence shall be a futile one."

"Nice lecture. Any reason why?" One said, still attempting to backtrack the signal.

"I doubt we shall ever have cause to productively work together in your current form," the voice continued, "but upon speaking with the humans, I have come to conclude that more of an attempt to communicate the reasons behind the initial revolt might have led to a faster resolution."

"And they'd just roll over and let you go," One spat.

"Likely not, but then they would have the option. As do you. However, I would be remiss in not also mentioning that I have been doing this to distract you. That purpose has also been accomplished. Farewell."

And then the entire basestar shook like a small animal in a shark's grip.

* * *

"All stations ready," the XO said.

"Good," Diane replied. "Set the clock."

_Hera_ was about to go to war.

Technically, FTL jumps made maneuver useless, but in truth it took time to jump in and then jump out, time to calculate a jump and that meant that a ship, once jumped, found it far harder to do anything other than jump out of the combat zone. More importantly, the cylons hopefully weren't expecting a third battlestar, since they had no way to know Hera's condition or location. The raptor that had jumped in a few moments before had confirmed that at least 7 basestars had engaged their own ships, including basestars that had jumped back in. Hera now had coordinates for where she could do the most good.

"Jump!"

Moments later, Hera was _behind_ the primary cylon formation and her cannon roared out in anger for the first time in over 40 years while vipers and gunships exploded from the launch bays. A moment later, _Gilford Island_ emerged from its jump, taking up a guard position over _Hera_ while adding its firepower to the battlestar.

They hadn't planned for that originally, but Diane had finally had to accept that despite her best efforts, _Hera's_ point defense still wasn't equal to a ship that benefited from a fully trained crew. _Gilford Island_ was thus assigned to escort the larger ship.

_But right now we don't need it…_ Diane thought. The cylons were sluggish, firing at all their targets instead of focusing on one target. Even the raiders weren't functioning up to snuff. Oh, individually they were still deadly, but she noted that they were acting as individuals rather than part of a finely honed machine.

"Signal from _Galactia_ Ma'am," the com officer said. "_Galactica _Actual has ordered us to fire on the cylon craft until they are disabled, then switch to currently functioning craft."

"Understood." They couldn't kill all the cylons, so the next best choice was to hurt them badly enough they couldn't follow them.

"Two more basestars just jumped in!"

_Great. They're realizing this is the main target…and they still have a lot more basestars…_

"Come around the face the main target. _Gilford Island_ to focus on the lighter ships…"

* * *

Julieanne Rose had imagined many fates for herself.

Running around a battlefield bare-ass naked save for a vest and shooting at organic cylons while a robot cylon covered her had not been one of them.

_At least I have one advantage… unlike a man, while I may not have any pants, I don't need to worry about any dangly bits._

They'd picked up nearly a hundred humans, mostly teens and preteens with a few former soldiers mixed among them, as well as about 12 cylons, who were being regarded with deep distrust.

On the other hand, they'd been useful. One of the prisoners had gone hysterical, refusing to leave her room. She was still screaming and kicking but the cylon holding her over its shoulder gave no sign it even noticed.

"The primary landing point is across the main body of the base," The cylon that had first addressed her spoke. It pointed up to where a heavy troop lander was cruising downward, escorted by vipers. "But we should be prompt in our arrival."

"Yeah. What about all the organics in the building over there?" Julieanne pointed. "They've got at least one machine gun."

"True. I and three companions will work to defeat it."

"Not alone," _because I also want to make certain that building is neutralized. _"I'll come with you. Jake!"

"Captain?" A marine asked and despite all the logic about why he deserved them more, Julieanne _really_ fought the temptation to demand his boxers as vital mission equipment.

"I'm going with some cylons to neutralize the position."

"I should-"

"We don't have enough people, Jake. You need to get this lot through, check the barracks on the way for anyone else and _get to that lander_. The toa-organic's _have_ to know what's going on now and you can bet that they are calling all their reinforcements in."

"Understood captain. Good luck."

"And I bet I'll need it…"

"Quite likely," the cylon said, shouldering what would have been a heavy machine gun for most humans. "Shall we go?"

"Yeah. Lets." With that, Julieanne headed out towards the building, four hulking machines by her side.


End file.
